London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Kensington 1944
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Kensington Borough]
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-19-
approval of the Ministry of Health, have taken preliminary
steps to deal with any possible outbreak of the disease
in the borough. The scheme includes arrangements for doing
disinfection and delousing at the Kensington station for
the adjoining boroughs of Hammersmith, Chelsea, Fulham and
Westminster. Certain equipment has been purchased. The
cost, and any expenses incurred during an outbreak of typhus
fever, will be borne by the five boroughs proportionately
in the ratio of their respective populations.
Diphtheria Immunisation. The following table shows the diphtheria immunisation work carried out during the year:-
| Pre-school children immunised | 692 |
| School children immunised | 346 |
| Children attending for pre-immunisation schick tests | 329 |
| Number who gave positive recation | 217 |
| Children attending for Schick tests after being immunised | 1,451 |
| Number proving negative | 1,176 |
| Number proving positive | 243 |
| Number who failed to attend for readings | 32 |
Acute Rheumatism in Children.
In 1927, the Council resolved to ask the Minister
of Health to make acute rheumatism in children a notifiable
disease, and this request was granted. The Councils established
a rheumatism, supervisory centre at the Princess Louise
Hospital and this continued to operate up to the outbreak of
war in 1939,when the hospital closed.
In June, 1944, the rheumatism supervisory centre
was re-established and Dr. Janet Aitken was appointed
physician-in-charge. The hospital provide nursing assistance
and other facilities, including the allocation of two
beds for acute rheumatism patients recommended by the centre.
The centre re-opened on the 23rd June, 1944, and has been
held on each Friday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. The re-conmencement
of the work coincided with the appearance of flying bombs,
and this had an unfortunate effect on the number of attendances.
Forty-eight individual cases attended during
the year. Of these 12 were referred to the Princess Louise
Hospital for in-patient treatment and were admitted to the
two hospital beds reserved by the Council. - These children
were in-patients for periods varying from one week to three
months .
One of the Council's health visitors attends each
session to act as liaison officer, and she made 28 visits to
the homes of patients.
TUBERCULOSIS.
During the year, 211 new cases of tuberculosis
were notified, of which 199 were respiratory and 12 nonrespiratory
cases.